To students who want to know what economics is about and why economics is interesting and useful to you, our economics staff members compiled the following list to you. If you find it take a long queue to get the book you are interested in, please let us know and we will put it in the Reserve section of the library and buy more copies of it, if our budget allows! Also, if you cannot wait to let us know other books that must be added to this list, please email us now!

 Yue Ma

Email: yuema at Ln dot edu dot hk

Head of Economics Department

9 Sept 2008

Entertaining and creative reading list of Economics at Lingnan Library:

 The following are 3 crime novels written by Marshall Jevons, a fictitious crime writer invented and used by 2 economic professors William Breit and Kenneth G. Elzinga, at Trinity University and University of Virginia, respectively. These economic novels are used for 1st year students in LSE, Chicago (as a core text in Alwyn Young's 1st year Economics course), and many US universities. The hero in the novels, Professor Henry Spearman, applies economic theory to determine who committed a murder. He uses economic theory as a lens to scrutinize all human behavior, and his character is based on Milton Friedman, who won a Nobel Prize in economics. 

Author Jevons, Marshall  1993

Title Murder at the margin : a Henry Spearman mystery

English collection (1/F North)   PS3560.E88 M87 1993 

Author Jevons, Marshall 

Title Murder at the margin. Chinese 

 邊際謀殺 / 馬歇爾・傑逢斯著 ; 江麗美譯

Chinese collection 3/F   874.575 42851 2006

Author Jevons, Marshall  1985

Title The fatal equilibrium

English collection (1/F North)   PS3560.E88 F3 1986

Author Jevons, Marshall 

Title The fatal equilibrium. Chinese 

 致命的均衡 : 哈佛經濟學家推理系列 / 馬歇爾・傑逢斯著 ; 葛窈君譯 ; 劉瑞華導讀

Chinese collection 3/F   874.575 4285 2006

Author Jevons, Marshall  2006

Title A deadly indiffernece. Chinese   奪命曲線 / 馬歇爾・傑逢斯著 ; 葛窈君譯

Chinese collection 3/F   874.575 42850 2006 

Freakonomics is another popular book for economics students in the US, and China:

Freakonomics : a rogue economist explores the hidden side of everything

Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner 2005

Blogs: http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/author/slevitt/

Reserve-3 Hrs   [RES]  HB74.P8 L479 2005   AVAILABLE 

English collection (1/F North)   HB74.P8 L479 2006 

Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner 2005

Title Freakonomics. Chinese   蘋果橘子經濟學

Chinese collection 3/F   550.14 4283 2006 

The following are two recent best-selling books by Tim Harford. The author demonstrates in these enjoyable books that powerful economics ideas can illuminate every aspect of the world:

(1) The logic of life : the rational economics of an irrational world / Tim Harford/New York : Random House, c2008. English collection (1/F North)   HB74.P8 H375 2008.

(2) The undercover economist : exposing why the rich are rich, the poor are poor--and why you can never buy a decent used car! / Tim Harford Harford/Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2006. English collection (1/F North)   HC59.15 .H35 2006.

The following is a list of other interesting books for economics students:

Author Frank, Robert H.  2008

Title The economic naturalist. Chinese  牛奶可樂經濟學 : 最妙趣橫生的經濟學課堂

LOCATION  Technical Service  BINDERY

Author Becker, Gary S. et al 1997 

Title Economics of life: from baseball to affirmative action to immigration, how real-world issues affect our everyday life

English collection (1/F North)   HC59.15 .B44 1997

Author Becker, Gary S. 1997 

Title Economics of life. Chinese   生活的經濟學

Chinese collection 3/F   550.9407 12

Author Ackoff, Russell Lincoln, 1987

Title The Art of problem solving : accompanied by Ackoff's Fables 

English collection (1/F North)   HD30.29 .A25 1978  

Title The Art of problem-solving : a resource for the mathematics teacher /

editor, Alfred S. Posamentier , c1996

English collection (1/F North)   QA63 .A78 1996 

Author Levine, Marvin, 1994

Title Effective problem solving / Marvin Levine

English collection (1/F North)   QA63 .L48 1994

Author De Bono, Edward, 1968 

Title The 5 day course in thinking / Edward de Bono

English collection (1/F South)   BF441 .D383 1968 

Author Fogler, H. Scott  c2008

Title Strategies for creative problem solving

English collection (1/F South)   BF449 .F7 2008   with   cd-rom 

Author Von Oech, Roger  2004

Title A whack on the side of the head. Chinese 

 當頭棒喝 : 如何讓你更有創意 / 羅傑・馮・歐克著 ; 范文毅譯 ; 喬治・威勒插畫

Chinese collection 3/F   176.4 8555 2004

Author 宋鴻兵  2007

Title 貨幣戰爭 = Currency wars

Chinese collection 3/F   560.9 3032 2007

The following book is edited by Lucia from our Department of Sociology and Social Policy. Economists are still largely thought of as scientists who merely observe markets from the outside, like astronomers looking at the stars. Do Economists Make Markets? boldly challenges this view. It is the first book dedicated to the controversial question of whether economics is performative – of whether economics, in some cases, actually produces the phenomena it analyzes. The book's case studies include financial derivatives markets, telecommunications-frequency auctions, individual transferable quotas in fisheries, strawberry auctions, and land reform in developing countries. These cases give substance to the notion of the performativity of economics in an accessible, nontechnical way. Some chapters defend the notion; others attack it vigorously. The book ends with an extended chapter in which Michel Callon, the idea's main formulator, reflects upon the debate and asks what it means to say economics is performative.

Do Economists Make Markets? On the Performativity of Economics

Edited by Donald MacKenzie, Fabian Muniesa & Lucia Siu, 2008

Publisher : Princeton University Press

http://www.ln.edu.hk/socsp/info/Abstract_Lucia3.php